Dillon's reviews

The always-entertaining Don Winslow has written a sprawling tale of the drug war that is relayed in unflinching transmissions from multiple characters, each person but a cog in the machine. The characters take part in a cross-border drama of futile necessity, all sides wounded physicallyand psychologically by the violence, by loss. The stakes rise to nauseating heights: losing means not a forfeit of life, but of humanity.  —Dillon

A story of men who are not yet men, of boys pretending, of a city that doesn’t care. Bill Beverly’s debut novel of an LA gang thrusts us into the lives of four teenage up-and-comers. Hotheaded, with everything to lose and everything to prove, the boys’ inevitable reckoning unfolds in gritty, rhythmic prose, even as one of them slowly questions their impulsive violence.  —Dillon

Witty, yet down to earth. Tough as nails, yet vulnerable somewhere on the inside. Somewhere untouchable. Elouise Norton is a shot of adrenaline for the detective genre. Sure, she ruffles feathers and deals in sarcasm like every detective since Marlowe, but she’s a rogue in a man’s world, an underdog with dimension and gravitas. When investigating a young girl’s apparent suicide, only Lou sees the killer under the crime, and only she can stop him.   —Dillon

Joe Hill writes books I savor. He’s a born storyteller—as might be expected of the son of Stephen King—and The Fireman is his most ambitious novel to date. Already drawing comparisons to The Stand (both novels are set in a post-apocalyptic world that has been made so by a terrible virus, though the “flu” incorporates spontaneous combustion), The Fireman is tightly wound, thoughtfully crafted, and born of the fantastical. It’s beautiful and horrifying, a true pleasure to read.  —Dillon

Complex in both style and content, Nguyen’s The Sympathizer offers an original and wholly rewarding reading experience. Our narrator chronicles Saigon’s fall and the political and personal fallout that ensues. A U.S.-educated Viet Cong mole, he undermines the country that has molded him to serve the country of his birth. As his external life collapses so too does his internal, evoking a heartbreaking, darkly comic view of what nationalism truly means.  —Dillon

The latest in the Hap and Leonard series is raunchy, twisted good fun. The two PIs are good ol’ boys with a penchant for vanilla cookies and Dr. Pepper. They’re sly, and apt to erupt into violence at the slightest (and I mean slightest) hint of injustice. Their “cases” aren’t so much jobs as digging themselves out of their own graves. Smart chemistry between leads centers a rollicking mystery that ain’t for the squeamish.  —Dillon

Following his Pulitzer Prize-winning novel, The Orphan Master’s Son, Johnson’s short fiction delves into isolation both political and personal, often as two sides of the same coin. The dreamlike stories unfold in crisp prose, and complex characters strive for connection even as they battle the subtle darkness of desperation. Hope weaves through like a golden thread, glimmering and elusive, a fiber holding the dreams together.

The Pulitzer Prize–winning author of Cleopatra offers a meticulously researched, insightful look at one of history’s stranger scars. Schiff lends cultural and historical context to the infamous Salem witch trials, which are still steeped in myth. Personal accounts shed light on various elements at play before the trials, while the examination of Puritan culture reveals, absurdly enough, a warped credibility in the proceedings. In this fascinating look behind the curtain, the devil is truly in the details.

A brooding, seething nihilism pervades Ben Sanders’ debut. Characters muse on existentialism while spiraling into necessary violence, alternating between questioning and accepting their own nature. Is spilling blood chosen or destined? Is there a way out? Perhaps the choice has become the destiny. Our central character is Jack Reacher as written by Cormac McCarthy, a man reconciling his morality and ferocity at every turn.  --Dillon

This is the spy novel at its most intimate. Elegant and aching, masterfully crafted, All the Old Knives exudes a subtle, delectable tension. Steinhauer uses alternating points of view between ex-lovers, one out of the game and one very much still in, to explore the murky details of an old job gone horribly wrong. Guarded emotions flare as a dangerous game of subterfuge plays out, each character vying to outwit the other over a deadly final meal.  --Dillon